I got myself a ballnut and of course had to cock up ending with the balls all over the floor (ha!). I've tried re-fitting the ballnut with everything that came out of it (minus 2 balls I think which got lost somewhere), but I'm struggling getting everything back inside the ballnut without a ball or two somehow getting in the unused lines and getting stuck in effect. I'm fitting everything through the side cover, like this:



[ignore the balls on that photo, it shows balls where they shouldn't be]

I've marked where the balls are pushed in, I do one ball at a time, stick it in with non-magnetic tweezers and move on to the next channel, so three balls, slight rotation of the ballnut to make a bit more space for new balls, fit another 3 and so on until I can see balls coming out on the other side. There's three circuits in the ballnut and I try to fill them equally.

I can fit all the balls apart from 3 and everything rotates smoothly. If I try and fit the last three, the balls barely fit in the channels (ie. the balls fill the channel around the ballnut, so start coming out on the other side), so when I put the side cover on, something must be ending up pushed into the wrong channel and then rubs / rattles inside as I move the ballnut.

The main question is, am I ok with 5 or so balls missing, or is it going to cause issues? another idea to get around this is put everything apart from the 3, then use some grease on the back of the cover where the return grooves are and stick the 3 there, before putting the cover on.

Regards,
dsc.